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‘Epoiesen’ on Greek Vases: Other Considerations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

Martin Robertson
Martin Robertson
Affiliation:
Lincoln College, Oxford
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Extract

Professor R. M. Cook has performed a valuable service by raising again the question of the meaning of this word in this context. He finds that the weight of argument goes against the view that it means ‘fashioned with his own hands,’ in favour of its implying ownership of the workshop from which the vessel issued. In the end I disagree with Professor Cook, but the evidence is difficult to evaluate and appears contradictory, and certainly does not justify an unquestioning acceptance of the first interpretation. There are perhaps a few more general observations to be made, and a few points on which his remarks require modification.

1. The position of those who interpret the word as ‘fashioned’ is not always quite so unquestioning as he seems to suggest. Beazley wrote in Potter and Painter in Ancient Athens (1944): ‘Two explanations have been offered for the epoiese-signature. One, that it gives the name of the potter, the man who fashioned the vase; the other, that it gives no more than the owner of the establishment from which the vase came. At one time I held it more prudent to adopt the second explanation: but I now believe that, in general, the first explanation is the right one: Ευφρονιος εποιεσεν means that Euphronios fashioned the vase with his own hands.’

2. Professor Cook writes that he knows only three vases which bear the same name with both egrapsen and epoiesen: two by Exekias and one by Douris.

Type
Notes
Information
The Journal of Hellenic Studies , Volume 92 , November 1972 , pp. 180 - 183
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1972

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References

1 JHS xci (1971) 137 f.

2 25 f. Beazley's italics.

3 ARV 2 240, no. 42; Athens Acr. 806, Langlotz pl. 72.

4 ARV 2 78, no. 102; Athens Acr. 6, Langlotz pl. 2. The end of επο[ιεσεν and the beginning of εγρ]αφσϵν are missing, with the name or και between them; but the small remains of the figure and the well-preserved and beautiful pattern-work leave little doubt that the name Epiktetos covers the second verb as well.

5 ABV 82, no. 1; Athens Acr. 611, Graef pl. 36. Νεαρχος μ' εγραφσεν κα[ποιεσεν. Possible alternative restorations would be κα[ι ανεθεκεν; or even εγραφσεν κα[λος; cf. another Acropolis fragment (ABV 170, no. 2; Acr. II 833) with Πριαπος εποιεσεν καλος; and a lip-cup (ABV 83, middle) has inscriptions on the two sides restored as Νεαρχος [εποιεσε]ν ευ and Νεαρχος επ]οιεσε[ν ευ, though I suppose the verb in the first could have been εγραφσεν, and the name in the second could have been another.

6 Refs. above, n. 3.

7 Perhaps defined as the front by the inscription; but the neck on the other side appears to be largely missing, and there may have been something else there.

8 Pottier, in Mon. Piot xxix 185Google Scholar, makes this suggestion, and Langlotz quotes him.

9 Refs. above, n. 4.

10 The plate would presumably be a comparatively easy form to shape, certainly much easier than the cup. None of Epiktetos' other plates has an epoiesen-signature. It would be interesting to study the details of shape of the Acropolis fragments and see if they correspond to those of any or all of the others. On nos. 92–8 of the list in ARV 2 the word egrapsen is written εγρασφεν, as often in the painter's early work; on no. 91 it is written εγραφσεν, as it is on no. 102, the Acropolis piece.

11 ABV 347, middle; Acr. 2134, Graef pl. 94 and p. 215; Pfuhl, MuZ fig. 235.

12 I believe that H. R. Immerwahr is undertaking this important task. See Postscript, 2.

13 On the Agora cup P 24113 (ARV 2 213, no. 242) the rhos in both the epoiesen-signature (Gorgos) on the interior, and the kalos-inscription (Krates) on the exterior, are tailed. I cannot find a tailed rho anywhere in the numerous inscriptions on vases ascribed to the Berlin Painter. I should have noticed this adverse (though not conclusive) evidence when arguing for the identity of the Berlin Painter with the Gorgos Painter and even with Gorgos himself (AJA lxii [1958] 55–66).

14 Pliny, NH xxxv 133Google Scholar.

15 Amazon-vase: ARV 2 772, no. θ; cup: ARV 2 763, no. 1; kantharos: ARV 2 764, no. 7; all with refs.; long ‘ο’: ARV 2 772, no. ζ (fr. of sphinx-rhyton in Villa Giulia).

16 A suggestion on these lines is made by Beazley Potter and Painter 27.

17 Cf. Beazley, Potter and Painter 21Google Scholar: ‘Of course the writer of the Sosias inscription need not have been the man he says he was’; but that is an inscription of a different kind—a rude graffito.

18 For convenience I use the lists as given in ARV 2, without taking account of Addenda or Paralipomena. I have, however, noticed bis-numbers and an occasional vacat, so that my figures are not always exactly what one would expect from the serial numbers in the lists.